Boston’s year-old police-civilian review board - touted as the people’s watchdog on cop abuses - is so shrouded from public view it stands out nationally as among the most secretive panels of its kind, a Herald review shows.
Not only is the public not invited to the board’s rare meetings, but its activities cannot be monitored because there are no minutes.
And why the secrecy?Sinnott said the board will publish an annual report next month, but few details about the cases reviewed will be revealed.
“The concern was if you get into the details of a particular case you may end up embarrassing police officers unnecessarily, and you may embarrass civilian complainants,” he said. “That’s why there’s some reluctance to get into individual cases.”
Good Lord, we wouldn't want to embarrass any police officers when investigating complaints of police wrong-doing, would we?
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